


Escape from Mount Loptr

by i_would_live_for_tony_stark21



Category: Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Video Game World, Arcades, Attempt at Humor, Canon Divergence - Post-Avengers (2012), Dragons, Fantasy, Gen, Humor, Magic, My First AO3 Post, My First Fanfic, My First Work in This Fandom, Post-Avengers (2012), SHIELD, Some Humor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-28
Updated: 2019-01-03
Packaged: 2019-09-29 03:26:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 6,333
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17195630
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/i_would_live_for_tony_stark21/pseuds/i_would_live_for_tony_stark21
Summary: written for the prompt (from Tumblr’s tonystarkismyprompt): The Avengers get trapped in a video game and each are given different powers/skill sets. They start the game separated and must find each other and fight their way out. Tony, who has created and played/defeated a few video games and has lots of technical expertise, leads the team in getting out safely.





	1. Introduction

**Author's Note:**

> Hello friends. This is my first attempt at writing fanfiction. Any and all feedback is welcomed and appreciated :) Submit fic requests [here](https://forms.gle/MWTRJtGwTQ8j6dWC6)

It had been a busy week. Between board meetings, working on the latest software update for the Starkphone, making an appearance at charity events, and defeating the increasingly laughable new villains of the week seeking world domination, Tony was exhausted. He had recently gotten home from the debrief for the most recent Avengers Assemble. The latest villain was fish themed—fish themed, really?—and had set mutant horse-sized walking fish on Coney Island. As if giant walking fish weren’t bad enough, they oozed acid wherever they went adding a great deal of property damage to the chaos already present. Tony had managed to repair the worst of the damage to the Iron man suit but he wasn’t able to get the fish smell out. 

“Hey JARVIS, tomato juice removes smells right? Maybe I could spritz tomato juice in the helmet before the next villain douses me in rotten eggs. That’s the only way this suit could smell worse.”

“Sir, unless the next villain unleashes skunks on the city, I doubt tomato juice would help very—

JARVIS was interrupted by the Avengers Assemble alarm. Tony sighed and started suiting up. With his luck there would be giant radioactive skunks running around Central Park. 

The call had been vague with a harried SHIELD operative describing monsters and cartoon characters running amok in Times Square and causing a sizeable amount of collateral damage. As the Avengers exited the Quinjet, Captain America momentarily paused, watching characters from Street Fighter sparring and sending balls of energy at each other as terrified tourists ran for shelter. Over half of the screens were dark, some were on fire, and others had sparks pouring out of them. Overhead a large maroon dragon was flying and breathing fire. Some agents were shooting with little success at pink ghosts from Pac-Man. 

“I wonder if Galaga guy is on site today, he would get a kick out of this,” Tony quipped. 

The captain shook his head in disbelief then started giving orders. 

“SHIELD, evacuate the remaining civilians and coordinate with local law enforcement to set up a 50 foot perimeter outside of Times Square. Black Widow, Hawkeye, Hulk, and Thor, try to contain the characters and prevent them from causing any more damage. Iron Man, on me, and let’s try to find the source. 

Iron Man flew towards an arcade where some zombies were slowly ambling out of the front door. He blasted a few with his repulsors and the zombies dissolved into grey and white pixels. A few hits from Captain’s shield took care of the rest. They entered the dark arcade and followed a malevolent laugh to the back of the building. Tony saw a flash of green and quickly fired off a repulsor blast as he and the captain were knocked through several arcade games by a magical blast. 

“Loki” Captain America grunted. 

“Let’s take this somewhere more out in the open” a slightly singed Loki replied. He teleported them back to Times Square and levitated above the fighting. Thor was wrestling to keep the dragon’s snout closed as Hulk was holding onto its tail to prevent it from flying away. Black Widow was sparring against 5 of the street fighter characters at the same time as Hawkeye was shooting exploding arrows at them, causing them to disintegrate. 

“Brother!” Thor exclaimed as Iron Man reflected a repulsor blast off of Captain America’s shield at Loki. Loki quickly threw up a magical shield and cackled as Thor lost his grip on the dragon’s mouth and it breathed fire onto him. The dragon surged upwards with a burning Thor desperately hanging from its throat and a surprised Hulk hanging off of its tail. 

Iron Man flew up to Loki’s eyelevel and aimed his hand repulsor. 

“Loki, if you just wanted the Avengers crossover in a video game, we’ll try to get into the next Super Smash Bros Ultimate.” Iron Man joked.

Loki smiled and replied “The Avengers in a video game, now that would be entertaining to play.”

Thor summoned lightning with Mjolnir and the dragon exploded into glittering yellow and orange pixels. The Hulk fell to the ground and leapt out of the crater he made while roaring “PUNY GOD!”

“End this now, you’ve had your fun” Captain America demanded as the Black Widow and Hawkeye finished off the last street fighter and joined the rest of the team. 

“My dear captain, the fun is just beginning” Loki replied as he disappeared. Tony shot a blue blast where Loki was in frustration.

Suddenly an arcade machine appeared in the Hulk-sized crater. Without warning, Thor flew towards the machine.  
“Thor wait!” Captain America shouted.

But it was too late, Thor struck the machine with a mighty blow from Mjolnir. The air around the team started to swirl and Loki’s laughter could be heard as the Avengers were sucked into the game.


	2. Level 1- Thor, Natasha, and Clint

**Thor**

Face stinging, Thor woke up in a grassy field. He groaned as he remembered how the dragon had blown fire directly into his face and the end of the battle with Loki. Regardless of Loki’s origin, they truly were brothers. While growing up, Thor had fallen victim to Loki’s wards on numerous occasions. He could easily detect Loki’s magical tampering with the machine. Loki knew his first instinct would have been to use Mjolnir to destroy Loki’s magically altered machine before anyone else could get hurt by it. The power generated by Mjolnir must have activated a spell that brought Thor and the others here. 

Thor stood up and looked around. There were small glittering purple jewels on a path in front of him. The path led to a forest and beyond that there was a snow covered mountain. Thor though it was a strange that there were jewels carelessly strewn on the ground and did not think he was on Midgard anymore. He tried to summon Mjolnir but found he couldn’t. When he looked at his hands he yelled. He couldn’t see them anymore. He stopped trying to call for his hammer and his body came back into view. What sorcery was this? Thor knew Loki was a powerful mage but not powerful enough to strip him of his powers and make him disappear. Thor didn’t want to leave the land of the living by magic, he would never achieve the glory of Valhalla that way. Thor decided he had to find the other Avengers and escape this realm that Loki had such great power over. 

He started running down the path and into the forest. To his surprise, the purple jewels started flying into a pouch he didn’t realize he had. He jumped over some logs and ditches in the ground as he continued down the path. He heard a hissing sound and felt a sharp pain as a snake bit him. He continued running around it and some of the purple jewels fell out of the bag and disappeared. He would have to venture forward more cautiously. 

**Natasha**

Natasha woke up in a garden in front of a house. She assessed her surroundings. She had no weapons and no idea where she was. Loki’s magic had transported her to wherever she was so she would try to gather as much information as she could and find the others. She went inside the house and found it only had one room with some kitchen appliances and a bookshelf. There was a book on the top shelf but she found she couldn’t move her arms sufficiently enough to climb up or even touch the bookshelf. She was only able to jump straight up and down in front of the bookshelf. Natasha was frustrated because there was very little she couldn’t access without her years of training and peak physical shape. She should have been able to climb up the shelf and grab the book in a few seconds. 

Suddenly the bookshelf creaked. Intrigued, Natasha continued focusing on her desire to get the book and the wooden shelf continued creaking and suddenly the book fell down breaking the shelves, causing projectile splinters to fly towards her. Natasha flipped backwards and out of danger, then went to pick the book up. She concluded that Loki’s magic controlled this world and that’s why bookshelves randomly exploded and she couldn’t move about as freely as she wanted to . She opened the book and the first page had a map. The map showed a path that started from a swamp and led to some grasslands bordered by some houses and farms—where she must be—a forest, a cave, a lake, and a mountain. The next few pages showed illustrations of a venomous green snake with sharp glistening fangs, raven sized vampire bats, brown rats the size of rabbits, tuna with razor sharp teeth, and baseball sized mosquitos. Another page showed purple crystals and a man transforming into a strong man as he got more crystals. Natasha tore the map out of the book then left the house to gather crystals and head towards the mountain and hopefully the other Avengers. 

**Clint**

Clint woke up in a dark cave and swore. Fucking Loki. The cave was pitch black except for a path lighted by torches on the cave walls. Clint walked down the path and saw floating, glowing purple crystals. He cursed again. Fucking magic. and turned around and started the other way on the path away from the unnaturally levitating crystals. He heard some rustling and the largest bat he has ever had the displeasure of seeing flew around the cave. Clint swore again, because what else could he do. He didn’t have his bow, he had no super strength, suit, or lightning to speak of. The bat had apparently heard him and swooped at his head. To his surprise, it went through his head but he didn’t feel the impact. “What the fuck?” His voice awakened some more bats and Clint decided nope, he was not dealing with this after this week. He apparently suddenly had the ability to phase through things and he was going to phase the hell out of this cave. “Fuck this” he declared and walked into a cave wall. He walked through the wall and out into a verdant green forest where he promptly crashed into a power walking Thor. 

“Arghhh” Thor screamed. Interesting, maybe his phasing only worked when he swore. Ominous music started playing and a large boa constrictor dropped out of the trees and started surrounding Clint. Thor was still yelling. “Shit” Clint declared and walked through the snake. Then he grabs it walks back towards the cave and sticks the snake into the rock wall. He went back to the path and couldn’t see Thor but could still hear him screaming. There were three snakes on the path that slunk off into the shrubbery. As soon as they were gone, Thor reappeared. “Are you done yelling? What’s the point of being invisible if you’re going to ruin it by being loud? Clint asked. 

Thor sheepishly replied, “I cannot fight any of the snakes here, whenever I try to summon Mjolnir to do so, my body disappears, possibly to Hel. It greatly disturbs me, so I yell to make sure part of my being stays on the mortal plane”.

“Thor, buddy, you’re not disappearing. I think your brother zapped us into a video game. That’s why we have powers. You have invisibility and I can phase through everything. We need to find the others and beat the level” Clint explained. 

He looked down the jewel littered forest path. “I guess collecting the crystals can’t hurt either. Let’s keep going towards the mountain and try to find the others” Clint said.


	3. Level 1- Bruce, Tony, Steve

**Bruce**

Bruce woke up to warm sun light filtering through the branches of an ancient weeping willow on his face. He was in a vibrant green forest with a sparkling blue waterfall. He felt peaceful and well rested which meant something was terribly wrong. He immediately knew the battle must have taken a turn for the worse because he had de-Hulked but still had clothes. Loki’s magic was surely at work here. 

As if on cue, the forest changed. The warm yellow sunlight changed to cold blood red light. filtered through the trees. The waterfall turned into a stagnant moss covered pool. Bruce felt himself losing control but instead of transforming into the Hulk he felt a surge of energy go through his chest to his extremities. A voice in his head yelled, “HULK RUN”. 

He did. 

**Tony**

Tony groaned as he came back to consciousness, face down in the dirt. Well that answered the question of whether he still had his suit. At least he didn’t smell like fish anymore. Thor and his stupid hammer. Thor was a runaway bulldozer in the field and while that usually worked in their favor, days like today it didn’t. While Tony wasn’t one for plans either, he knew how to think on his feet. Thor tended to solve all of his problems by hitting them. 

Grumbling, he flopped over and took in the tall brown grass, the bright blue sky, and the brilliant three suns. “Well Toto, we’re definitely not in Kansas anymore”. Tony figured they were in the arcade game they were sucked into. From his limited understanding of magic, it would take too much energy, without a device like the Bifrost or the Tesseract, for Loki to send all of them off world. 

Video games, he could do video games. He beat Clint at Mario Kart every time they played and had written and edited the code for quite a few successful games. He stood up and tried to get a feel for the game. He was in a grassland. A dirt path led in two directions. One path went further into the grass and had glowing, floating lavender crystals. A large mountain loomed overhead in the distance. There were dark storm clouds obscuring the peak. Oh that mountain just screamed boss battle. He would have to find the others and head there to confront Loki. The other path went towards a swampland. 

Tony ran and collected some of the crystals. He tried jumping. He was able to double jump by thinking about jumping again while mid-air. If this was Loki’s world, there would definitely be enemies. Tony imitated his repulsor blast position and thought about firing. His hand turned into a blue flame the same color as his arc reactor. Awesome, he could weaponize his body. His hand shifted into a stone hammer then a metal blade. Grabbing one of the crystals from his pouch, he was able to make his entire body metal. So that’s what they did. 

“HULK RUN” was all Tony heard as he was knocked off his feet, landing in the dirt close to where he woke up. He quickly stood up and saw a cloud of dust heading towards the swamp. Tony quickly turned his body to fire and hovered for a few seconds, getting a feel for how to maneuver and fly as a flaming body and not in the suit, then zooming forwards. He never thought he’d be jealous of the Human Torch but here he was, envying how freeing it was to feel the wind rushing past his hair as he soared over the grasslands and into the swamplands. 

**Steve**

Steve awoke to the sound of a frog croaking. He was surrounded by decaying reeds, glowing animal eyes that peered from the darkness, fog, and an ominous buzzing noise that seemed to come from the ground itself. He found it difficult to breathe and took off his helmet. As he stood up, his uniform hung loosely off of him. In shock, he dropped his helmet and it rolled down a path covered in grey fog. His heart sunk. Loki must have done something to interfere with the serum and dropped him off in this eerie swamp. He knew he should try to find the others and Loki after that but he had never felt so helpless and alone. It would be next to impossible to traverse the terrain without his asthma acting up and who knew how many miles he would have to walk before he found anyone else. Steve’s quickly rising panic was abruptly interrupted by a shout.

A strange high pitched voice screamed “HELP!” Never one to ignore a cry for help, Steve jogged into the bog and followed the sound of the voice. He came to the edge of a swamp where three navy green mosquitos as large as his fists were circling a tiny neon blue tree frog. 

“You there, hero, save me from these mosquitos, they’re going to eat me” the blue frog screeched. 

Steve put his fists up and shouted, “Hey insects, why don’t you pick on someone your own size?”

The ground began to tremble and dozens of mosquitos started erupting from the soil and gathering in a swarm.


	4. Level 1- Entering the Caves

**Clint and Thor and Natasha**

Clint and Thor continued gathering crystals and heading down the forest path until they came to a large black boulder blocking a cave entrance. They both try pushing the boulder but it doesn’t budge. “Well this sucks” Clint remarks. “I could phase through the boulder but I really don’t want to deal with all the blood sucking bats in there by myself. And besides, I think we should stick together.”

“Verily.” Thor replied. “There are bats?”

“Yea, as big as your head. I would know, one flew threw my head and then I realized I could phase” Clint said. 

“Phase?” a familiar female voice questioned. 

Clint whipped around and exclaimed “Natasha! Yeah, I can walk through pretty much anything now. What can you do?”

Natasha frowned, “I have no idea what you’re talking about but look at this map I found.” She showed them the map. “We have to head towards the mountain. There are a lot of dangerous animals on the way but I haven’t run into any yet and I’ve been through some grasslands and this forest” she said. 

“You haven’t run into anything?!” Clint exclaimed. “I woke up in a cave full of bats!”

“I was bitten by a snake” Thor interjected. 

“And the snakes, we had a mini battle with them! Thor turned invisible until they left and I stuck one into a cave wall” Clint continued. 

Natasha continued frowning. She and Clint had a nonverbal conversation of pointed looks, gestures, and nods. Thor looks on in confusion. Clint exclaims, “I’m not compromised Nat, Loki put us in a video game and we all have different powers. We should try to figure yours out too. It’s only a matter of time before something else attacks us. And maybe your power can help us move the boulder.” 

Thor added, ”I disappear when I call for Mjolnir and in battle.”

“And I phase when I swear” Clint continued.

Natasha cursed and nothing happened. She concentrated on an image of her Glock and suddenly she was floating in the air. She slowly lowered herself to the forest floor. 

“You can control gravity!” Clint shouted. Immediately afterwards, the sunlight filtering through the trees turned blood red and a cold wind started to blow. An unearthly wail pierced the silence, gradually increasing in volume as if getting closer. 

“That can’t be good” Clint commented. 

“Natasha! Move the boulder!” Thor fearfully cried.

Natasha focused on the boulder and tried to lift it up. It wiggled a bit but did not move from the ground. She tried harder and grunted from the exertion. It rose a few inches. The wailing was joined by other wails and continued to get louder. Natasha suddenly remembered the image of the crystals she saw in the book. She grabbed a few out of her pouch and was able to move the boulder up. 

“GO GO GO!” she shouted as Clint and Thor scrambled into the cave. She ran in after them and quickly lowered the boulder back in front of the cave entrance. A few seconds after she set the boulder down, they could hear wailing, wood splintering and what sounded like something clawing at the rock boulder. 

“That was terrifying. But these caves are going to be a whole lot worse if we don’t do them right. Sound wakes the bats up so we need to be as silent as possible” Clint whispered. “I’m thinking Thor should turn invisible and scout ahead. If there are no bats, we should run through as quickly as possible. If they’re there we’ll have to fight while not leaving the cave because of whatever unnatural thing is outside the cave.”

**Bruce and Steve and Tony**

Steve looked on with a sense of rising horror as around forty mosquitos flew in a circle above the whimpering blue frog. They seemed to be waiting for him to make the next move. He stood no chance trying to fight the swarm and would probably die by having all the blood sucked out of his 90 pound frame if he tried. And that still wouldn’t help the tiny frog escape them. 

He heard a distant shout of “HULK RUN” and felt a swell of hope. 

“Here! Here! Hulk, it’s Steve and I need help” Steve shouted. He ran towards the shouting. The mosquitos stood no chance against the Hulk. 

A few seconds later, Bruce appeared in a cloud of dust. Bruce confusedly asks “Steve! Steve! Oh no, you’re little? Loki was able to tamper with the super soldier serum?! This is so weird, I think he’s messing with my transformations too. I Hulked out in this scary forest and now suddenly I’m here, but I haven’t ripped my clo—WOAH are those mosquitos?” Bruce paused and looked at the growing swarm permeating the sky. “Steve we have to get out of here and find the others” Bruce said hurriedly. 

“But we can’t just leave the frog, they’ll eat him!” Steve cried.

“What frog? They’ll eat **us** if we stay here." Bruce replied.

Steve jutted out his chin and declared, “Well I won’t leave him.” He started jogging back towards the frog. “Maybe, I could grab the frog and run and you wait here for a bit before running in the other direction. Hopefully they’ll follow you and you can outrun them, you got here pretty fast. Then, we can regroup and then find the others.”

Trailing behind Steve, Bruce replied “That’s a terrible plan! I’m not doing that. I don’t even remember how I got to the swamp, do you really think the Hulk will remember to meet up with you? Maybe, I can find someone else and then come back for you.” 

“Help me” cried the little frog. Unexpectedly, the now hundred odd mosquitos that had been buzzing around in random circles all stopped moving and turned to face Bruce, Steve, and the frog. 

Steve dashed forward and grabbed the frog before running back to the path and doing his best to shield it. But instead of attacking them, the mosquitos started being blasted into dark brown and navy green pixels by blue fireballs being shot by a fiery light blue human figure holding onto two purple crystals. The figure grabbed several crystals and let out an arc of fire from the center of his chest, killing at least half of the mosquitos. 

A familiar voice asked, “Science bro, mini Cap. Do you have any powers that can help?”

“Tony! Well I can run really fast but it’s like Hulking out, I have no recollection of it afterwards” Bruce said. “If you could convince the Hulk to run in circles, maybe he could make a tornado and you can add some fire to it to get rid of the rest?” Bruce replied.

“Sounds good. Let’s start on that.” Tony asked as Bruce shouted “Hulk RUN”. 

While blasting any mosquitos that got close, Tony calmly asked, “Hey Jolly Green, it’s Tin Man. I know I look a bit different but I really need your help. Could you run really fast in a circle?”

Hulk in Bruce’s body grunted and started running in a circle, generating a twister, before running back to the path. Bruce regained control just in time to see a blazing blue fire tornado decimate the remainder of the mosquitos. The last few mosquitos flew off into the sky as the twister disappeared. 

Tony flew over to them before landing and extinguishing. 

“Tony, do you have any idea where we are? It looks off world.” Bruce exclaimed while gesturing up. Steve’s mouth dropped open in shock. He hadn’t even noticed the three suns in the sky this entire time.

“Bruce, Cap” Tony acknowledged. “Oh boy. Well gentlemen, we’re trapped in a video game of Loki’s design. We should all have powers to battle the monsters of the world while we head towards the mountain. If I designed the game, I would end the level on the mountain. What’s your power Steve?”

The tiny blue frog interrupted, “Clearly, it is heroism. Even though he is small he came to my rescue. My name is Loptr and I am a magical fae. The horrible creatures of this world always try to capture me for my power. As a thank you for saving me, I can take you three to the base of the mountain if you’d like. I’m heading there anyways.”

“No thanks, we need to find the rest of our team and besides we need to gather more crystals.” 

“Very well, at the very least let me give you some crystals.” Loptr replied. 

Pouches suddenly appeared on Steve and Bruce’s waists. Bruce opened his and quickly counted 15 crystals. Tony felt his pouch get heavier as well. 

“Thank you and safe travels.” Tony said, giving off his best press smile as Loptr suddenly sprouted wings and flew off. 

“Tony, what was that all about?” Steve asked angrily. “We could have been at the mountain. I can barely jog without the serum and I don’t have any powers like you guys.”

“And we wouldn’t have stood a chance against Loki in Loki’s world without the entire team and no power ups. Besides, I don’t trust that guy. Video game NPC don’t just offer up shortcuts to the end of the game. Also, Capsicle, you have to have powers. It wouldn’t make any sense for you not to. Now Bruce’s speed seems to be triggered by fight or flight. My substance mimicry works when I pretend I’m in the suit. Maybe, you could try imagining throwing the shield and see if that triggers anything” Tony said. 

Steve felt stupid but he closed his eyes and imagined throwing his shield. Even if he had his shield now, he probably couldn’t even lift it. “Anything happen?” Steve questioned. 

“No, but maybe you’re like me and your powers will come out when you’re truly in danger.” Bruce answered.

“We need to start heading towards the mountain and trying to find the others. Steve, don’t worry about it, we’ll run into more enemies and you should be able to use your powers. Tony said while pulling out two crystals, “Let’s try something to speed our journey up.”

Tony placed his hands on Bruce and Steve’s shoulders and suddenly all three of them were fire. Tony’s flames were his characteristic arc reactor blue, Bruce’s were green, and Steve’s were red. “Okay awesome, now let’s try flying together. We’ll need to go close to the ground to gather more crystals but flying should speed things up considerably. We could use Bruce’s superspeed too but I have more crystals to burn through than he does at the moment”. 

Other than a few crashes when they failed to maneuver as a unit, they had an uneventful flight. They quickly flew through the swampland, the grassland, some scattered houses, and into the forest. They even managed to outfly a few mosquitos, rats, and snakes. They landed in the forest right outside of a large cave covered by a gargantuan black boulder. 

Instantaneously, a screaming Thor, murderous Natasha, and annoyed Clint appeared right in front of the boulder. “Goddamn it Thor. It literally killed you to be quiet” Clint said.

“Point Break, Itsy Bitsy, Katniss! Good timing. I take it that we can respawn in this game? That’s a relief. How did you guys, you know” Tony mimed cutting his neck. 

“Thor tripped over a snake Clint phased into the cave wall earlier. That broke his focus and he went from invisible to visible, saw the bats, and screamed like a child. I tried to use some rocks and pillars to kill the bats but apparently I made gravity too heavy when pulling on one of the pillars and collapsed the cave“ Natasha said in a monotone voice.

“Wow, okay so Thor is invisible, Clint can phase through matter, and you can manipulate gravity. And there are bats?” Tony responded and Natasha nodded. I can mimic different substances, Bruce has superspeed, and we’re not sure what Steve can do yet.” 

Suddenly, Steve was lifted upwards and placed on top of the boulder. Corrosive acid emanated from his feet and hands. He pointed his hands downwards onto the boulder and within a few minutes the great boulder was destroyed enough for him to hop off onto the path. 

Natasha smiled and remarked, “Steve can make acid.”

Stepping over the still disintegrating remnants of the boulder, the Avengers entered the cave.


	5. Scaling Mount Loptr

“Now everyone stay quiet, if we can get past the cave then all we have to do is get across a lake and we’ll be at the mountain according to a map Natasha found” Clint whispered. 

“A lake? Ugh, underwater levels are the worst” Tony muttered. 

The Avengers crept down a poorly lit path lined with dripping stalagmites and stalactites. They walked in single file, led by Tony and with Clint at the caboose. The path split into two with one entering a large cavern and the other a series of large steps going towards the ceiling of the cave. “You guys collapsed one of the bat filled caverns, right? Let’s try the other path then. It looks pretty high but we should be able to double jump from step to step” Tony said. Tony explained how to double jump and the Avengers went up and down the steps until they reached a dark murky pool in the cave. There were brown rats swimming in the water. Tony gestured for Clint to follow and for the rest of the Avengers to wait. 

“Clint, if the next area is a lake, do you think this cave pool could be connected to it? Could you try diving to the bottom and seeing if there’s anything there? You can phase through anything you run into while I take care of the rats up here.” Tony asked. 

Tony changed his hand into a stone hammer and Thor gasped. Tony and Clint jumped into the water as the rest of the Avengers looked on. The rats bared their teeth and started swimming towards Tony. He hit them with his stone hand while treading water with his other. Meanwhile, Clint dove deep into the pool. At the bottom, there was a large circular black gate. Clint swam back to the surface and saw Tony obliterating the last of the rats. 

Clint and Tony hopped out of the pool and Clint explained what he saw. Tony grinned, “Clint, if you take out five crystals, as long as we’re all touching, whenever you phase, we’ll be able to as well. We can go through the gate and see where it takes us”.

The Avengers hopped into the pool and dove down. Holding hands, they phased through the gate and were instantaneously transported to the sandy bottom of the lake. A large tuna with unnaturally large teeth started swimming towards them. 

“Nobody let go! Phase, Clint, phase!” Tony shouted. Clint phased then started swimming upwards away from the tuna. As they went up, they phased through floating seaweed and another tuna. At the surface, the Avengers realized they were about halfway across the lake. 

“Bruce, do you think you can run us across the lake?” Tony asked. 

“I can try.” Bruce replied. He tried to run on the water but started sinking almost immediately. He changed tactics and started swimming and shot across the surface of the water. Soon, the Avengers were hyper-kicking their way across the surface of the lake. They reached the shore of the lake and followed a path leading to the base of the mountain.

Once they were on the path, Clint looked down and whistled. They were nearly at the top of the mountain. Above the clouds, they could see a spinning portal at the peak of the mountain. “That’s our way out” Tony said confidently.

They continued upwards avoiding strong winds while climbing ladders, jumping onto more moving clouds, running across rickety bridges with holes in them. Finally, the Avengers reached a clearing underneath the portal. 

Tony said, “Ok folks, crystals out, powers ready. Get ready for a boss battle with—"

“Loptr!” Steve interrupted, seeing the tiny blue frog sitting on snowdrift underneath the portal. 

“Hero Steve, other heroes. What brings you to Mount Loptr?” Loptr asked, voice deeper and louder than Steve, Tony, and Bruce remembered. Thor frowned at the name, trying to remember where he had heard it before.

Steve walked closer to the frog and replied excitedly, “We’re going through the portal to get back home!”

“While you may go back home, you will not find what you seek” Loptr replied. He started growing in size and transforming into a large blue dragon. Steve fell over in surprise. “There is no escape.” 

“Bruce” Tony began.

“Already on it” Bruce replied, running and grabbing Steve out of the way as Loptr exhaled an icy blast where Steve had been just seconds earlier. 

“Loki, cease this. Ever since your escape from Asgard, you have caused chaos with your attacks but you haven’t killed anyone. You still have good in you, brother” Thor implored.

The dragon roared. “I am not your brother! Maybe, it’s time to change that,” Loki replied before splitting into six dragons.

Tony shouted, “Pair up! Steve with Clint, Bruce with Thor, and Natasha with me. Work together to defeat your dragons and help the others when you can.”

Thor gets two of the dragons to chase him then turns invisible. Behind the dragons, Bruce runs in a circle and creates two twisters that hits both of the dragons. At the same time, Clint and Steve phase through a dragon that bursts into pixels a few seconds later, acid spilling on the ground. Meanwhile, Natasha lifts two of the dragons up in the air before slamming them down onto the mountain. As they open their mouths to exhale, Tony shoots fireballs into their mouths, causing them both to explode into pixels. Thor baits Steve and Clint’s remaining dragon allowing Natasha to easily slam the distracted dragon up and down several times until it bursts into pixels. Bruce and Tony create several fire tornados aimed at the remaining two dragons. Clint and Steve phase and poison another dragon clone. The last dragon scowls and flies into the air and then the portal. 

Triumphant music plays and the portal lowers. Tony frowns remembering Loki’s words, and the fact that when bosses got away, you usually weren’t at the end of the game. But, what choice did they have other than to go through the portal? 

The Avengers enter the portal and are transported back to Times Square. Steve is restored to his supersoldier body. They board the Quinjet and head back to Avengers Tower.  
Once they get back, Steve suggests they all freshen up then come to the common floor for a movie night to destress from the week. As Tony’s showering, he remembers they didn’t have a debrief. He can’t remember a time where he wasn’t given shit for skipping out on a SHIELD debriefing. Something is off. Tony quickly turns off the water and wraps a towel around his waist. He runs to the window and he sees diagonally placed clouds among the buildings of the New York skyline. There’s a swarm of Doombots above the Empire State building. No, no, no. They did not get through that adventure in fairyland for that just to be the first level. 

Tony quickly gets dressed and rushes down to the common floor and calls for the other Avengers. He explains what he saw and that they’re still in the game. They have to rebel against the game by ignoring the Avengers call and hopefully then they would be able to confront Loki again. If they complied, who knew how many levels of this game they would be forced to play for Loki’s amusement. 

As if on cue, the Avengers Assemble alarm rings. The Avengers take a seat on the couch. The alarm starts to ring louder. Thor booms, “LOKI” periodically, every few minutes. 

After thirty minutes of sitting with the alarm and Thor, an irritated Loki bursts through one of the windows. 

“WHAT?” Loki demands.

“Brother, if you do not release us from this game, we will not play it. We will stay here and I will continue speaking to you now that I know you are listening. I would have words with thee, bro—” Thor continues.

“NOT your brother. Fine, I will cast you all back to your precious Midgard, as long as you cease your incessant prattling” Loki snapped. 

The Avengers were suddenly sucked into a swirling whirlwind and passed out. They woke up in Times Square surrounded by SHIELD personnel and doctors. Fury stalked out to meet them and demanded an immediate debrief about Loki’s location and what the hell happened that took all six of the Avengers out of commission for 4 hours. 

Now that was more like it. Maybe Tony would actually go to this debrief. It’s not like anybody other than Clint knew anything about video games.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys, this is the end of my first work here on AO3. Thanks for reading!! I've been a long time reader and after writing for the first time, shoutout to all the awesome writers here that give us such entertaining works to read. I'm always receptive to comments about my writing/plot etc. Anything you loved/hated? Feel free to comment. And if you liked it, please leave a kudos so I know how many people are actually reading this :)

**Author's Note:**

> List of the Avengers powers in the video game:  
> Steve-toxin creation  
> Bruce-speed  
> Thor-invisibility  
> Natasha- alter gravity  
> Clint-phase through matter  
> Tony-substance mimicry
> 
> Submit fic requests [here](https://forms.gle/MWTRJtGwTQ8j6dWC6)


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